The DC journo band Suspicious Package played an Italian beach town on Aug. 24. Courtesy Photo.

A D.C. based band of journalists, Suspicious Package, rocks Italy with great beats.

By John Arundel

The DC journo band Suspicious Package played an Italian beach town on Aug. 24. Courtesy Photo.

Who ever said the Italians could never appreciate great music coming from a band of not-so- stuffy Washington journalists?

The DC-based journo rock band Suspicious Package played its first overseas gig in Porto Recanati, Italy in late

Who might have thunk a band of DC journalists could rev up a crowd of Italians so? Courtesy Photo.

August, bringing down the house for the 1,000 or so Italians in attendance at Arena Beniamino Gigli, a 12th century castle courtyard named after the great Italian tenor.

The band — comprised of Tim Burger, Bryan Greene,Josh Meyer,Christina Sevilla and Tom Toles — was invited to the region after playing a party for New York Times Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Thomas Friedman, who last spring received the Urbino Press Award for distinguished journalism at the Embassy of Italy in Washington.

Suspicious Package performed American rock and pop covers as well as originals, opening for Jerry Lee Lewis impresario Matteo Orsini, also known as Matthew Lee, Italy’s “rockin’ piano man.”

Concert clips aired on local TV news, and band members were tickled to see Suspicious Package concert posters up all over the Adriatic beach town.

“Stranger things have happened in the course of human history,” joked Sevilla. “We just can’t think of what they might be.”

Over 1,000 Italians came out on a warm summer evening to hear the band play. Courtesy Photo.